A research team from Washington State University (WSU) (Pullman, Washington, USA) received a two-year commercialization grant from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust to develop a market-ready, non-structural prototype of building materials made from construction waste. According to WSU, these building materials are designed to reduce waste, create affordable building materials for interior applications, and lower housing costs.
Drywall was chosen as the construction waste material because it is common, inexpensive, and has excellent fireproofing qualities. Each year, ten million tons of drywall is dumped into U.S. landfills, making up about 9% of all construction waste. There are also environmental hazards to consider— decomposing drywall in landfills produces a noxious gas.
The WSU team, which includes Taiji Miyasaka and David Drake, professors from WSU’s School of Design and Construction, developed a unique process that pulverizes drywall scrap and mixes it with water and carbon-neutral binders. This drywall waste is then pressed into building blocks that can be made on- or off-site and uses up to 90% of the material.
The drywall-based building blocks are durable, fireproof, and weigh half as much as their concrete counterparts. In addition, they provide ten times more insulation than conventional concrete blocks and can also be cast into various colors and shapes for tiles, panels, and pavers.
The WSU team, which developed the underlying technology behind the project back in 2017, is working with DTG Recycle, the Pacific Northwest’s largest recycler of construction waste, on building a full-scale assembly wall to demonstrate the real-world viability of the building materials.